


It's Cold Without You.

by iwasnthere



Series: At First Sight [3]
Category: Liam Payne (Musician), One Direction (Band), Zayn Malik (Musician)
Genre: Holidays, I felt sad, M/M, This came up, Winter, breaking up, fight, holiday fic, sorry - Freeform, thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-09
Updated: 2019-01-09
Packaged: 2019-10-07 04:18:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17358806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iwasnthere/pseuds/iwasnthere
Summary: "Please look at me." Liam asks softly. "I - I don't want to fight.""If I look at you - I'm gonna want to beg you not to do this." Zayn sniffles a bit. Fuck. He hates being the reason for Zayn's tears. He's never been the reason before, and now that he is, he wants to punch himself repeatedly for ever causing pain on the one person that has made him so irrevocably happy."Zayn." Liam takes his boyfriend's hands and kisses them repeatedly. "I love you. I love you so much and you've made me so happy."





	It's Cold Without You.

It feels as if it's been hours since Liam's been staring at his empty coffee cup while sat on the table of the dining room to his childhood home. It was Christmas holidays for him so he got the chance to go home and just - rest. Rest from medical school, rest from internship, rest from revisions. He should be taking advantage of this. He should be milking the "most wonderful time of the year", since heaven knows when he's gonna get a good night's rest when the holidays are over.

But he's here.

Staring at an empty coffee cup. Letting his thoughts take over his mind, yet blanking on them anyway. 

He's not thinking about anything in particular. No. He's not thinking of hazel eyes, crinkly smiles and hearty laughter. He's not thinking of the smell of vanilla and cigarettes. He's not thinking of the taste of black coffee across luscious lips in the morning.

He's not thinking of Zayn. And what he might be doing at his own home. He's not thinking about whether or not he's found himself someone else to spend the holidays with. He's not thinking about how it has been two weeks, three days and a couple of hours since they broke up.

 _Breaking up_. Huh. Funny way to word things. You break something and follow it up with a positive word. Liam wonders how that works. 

"A penny for your thoughts?"

Liam startles at the soft sound of his mother from across the dining table, dulling out the whispers of  _May your days be merry and bright_  
_And may all your Christmases be white_ that is playing from the radio in the living room.

Liam chuckles lightly. "I'm okay, mum, really. Just," He sighs. "Thinking."

"About him?" Karen gives him a small smile as he looks up at her. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Karen reaches from her place at the table to take one of his hands in hers. Her genuine touches and glances was all that held him together lately. He remembers when he was a kid, he would always look to his parents when he was happy, sad, lonely, bright, angry - everything. When he came out to them, he was crying so much he couldn't even explain yet but his parents just hugged him and said that they knew and that there was absolutely nothing in this world that would ever change their love for him. 

He's so, so grateful for them. Everything, and he means _everything_ , he does is for them.

"I'd rather talk about how you all deal with home without me." Liam grins. 

Karen raises an eyebrow at him. "You think it's hard? It's one less mouth to feed for sure."

"I know you miss me." Liam sticks his tongue out playfully.

"I miss you all the time." Karen says thickly. Tears starting to brim in her eyes.

Liam laughs a bit thickly, squeezes his mum's hand. "I miss you too. Loads."

At such a tender topic, his dad decided to enter the dining room red faced and carrying a shovel.

Karen giggles. "Shovelling snow isn't fun when you wait too long to do it, huh?"

Geoff grumbles under his breath. "Fucking snow."

"Language." Liam scolds playfully. He loves them both so much.

Karen smirks and lets go of Liam's hand to get up and take the shovel from her husband. "I'll take this, and why don't you go shower and change into warmer clothes. I'll make you a cuppa"

Geoff smiles at her lovingly and kisses her cheek. "Thank you, honey."

Liam should be disgusted. Being twenty five years old and seeing your parents' PDA isn't really a place to be but he smiles. He's just so in awe of how much his parents stayed in love for so long. He wonders if he'll ever get a chance to love like that, to have a love like that.

Fingertips brush his cheeks bring him back to reality. "You've been spacing out a lot, lately, honey."

"Nah, just really amazed at how you and dad still love each other so immensely after all these years." Liam says honestly. "Was there ever a time you thought that, you know, it was too, um - much?"

Karen smiles at him. "I was pregnant with Nicola." She starts. "We got married at a twenty, I got pregnant at twenty one. I barely understood my own life, how much more a baby's?" 

Then she gets this fond, faraway look in her eyes. "I remember all the times I pushed your father away. I know I loved him, I knew. I was scared though. Terrified. I didn't know if I was ready. Turns out, we never really are until we're just forced to be in a situation. And then you realise that life forces you in a situation, but it is your choice to stay."

Liam stares at her. There is literally no one in this world that he thinks is ever gonna be stronger than his mum. No one.

"And your father, he kept choosing me." Karen looks at Liam fondly. "He chose to stay despite my fears. He chose to stay despite my failures, knowing he had his too."

"He chose to love me every single day, baby. Up until today." She grins. "Love is a choice, my love. He kept choosing me."

Liam sighs. "Was there a time you didn't choose him?"

Karen shakes her head. "There were times I thought I wouldn't. Times I thought I couldn't anymore. But at the end of the day, I realise that I wouldn't choose anybody else."

\--

After that talk with his mum, he was pushed to get some rest upstairs since, well, in her own words he hasn't been sleeping and eating well enough.

_You're losing weight, losing sleep and you are not about to lose your mind on me, Liam James. You cannot save people if you aren't saving yourself._

He's staring up at the ceiling as he lays on his childhood bed with his phone on his chest. He closes his eyes and recalls the last conversation he had with the one person who has occupied his mind these days.

_Liam sighs. "It's just all a bit much, right now."_

_Zayn flinches. "What are you saying?"_

_"I - Zayn, I -"_

_"We're breaking up, aren't we." It wasn't a question. Zayn was looking down at his hands as he was sat beside Liam on the couch of Zayn's flat._

_"It's not that I don't want this, Zayn. I do, I love you and -"_

_Zayn nods his head without looking at Liam. "You have a lot on your plate right now. I get it."_

_"You don't. Zayn, I don't even know what I'm doing and I'm so confused. I haven't slept properly in weeks and we haven't spent more than a few hours together just this week and we're fighting a lot and -"_

_"I get it, Liam. You don't have to enumerate all the reasons why our relationship has become the failure that it is." Zayn says thickly. He's still not looking at Liam._

_"Please look at me." Liam asks softly. "I - I don't want to fight."_

_"If I look at you - I'm gonna want to beg you not to do this." Zayn sniffles a bit. Fuck. He hates being the reason for Zayn's tears. He's never been the reason before, and now that he is, he wants to punch himself repeatedly for ever causing pain on the one person that has made him so irrevocably happy._

_"Zayn." Liam takes his boyfriend's hands and kisses them repeatedly. "I love you. I love you so much and you've made me so happy."_

_The older boys shakes his head and turns away from Liam, pulling away his hands. "I don't want to fight either. At least not with you."_

_"Zayn," Liam repeats. "I need you to know that nothing is your fault. You haven't done anything. I swear."_

_Zayn goes to respond but Mavis decides that it would be a good time to jump on the couch to fill in the space between the two boys. She looks at Liam, albeit, curiously, before turning to Zayn and nuzzles his nose against his jaw._

_Zayn giggles a bit wetly. "Mavis is always on time, huh."_

_Liam gives out a small smile, despite the tears forming in his eyes. "I love you both so much."_

_"Sometimes I wish that could be enough." Zayn wipes at his tears and lets out a deep breath. "Well. I guess this is goodbye."_

_Liam moves to face the turned off telly in front of them. "I don't want to say goodbye."_

_"But you have to." Zayn finishes for him. "It's the best for both of us."_

_Is it really? Liam thinks. He doesn't even know why he's doing this. To set Zayn free? Does he even want to be? Or is he just plain stupid?  
_

_"Thank you for the wonderful year and a few months, Li." Zayn shifts in his spot to lean his head on Liam's shoulder. "I love you."_

His phone beeping takes him out of his flashback and back to present reality. It was a notification from Instagram, he's got his notifications on for Zayn's posts, and he guesses he hasn't really changed that option yet. He doesn't know if he wants to change that option.

He goes to check the post and sees that it was a simple selfie of Zayn's with Mavis licking his cheek. His hair's a bit longer now and he was wrapped up in a coat and scarf as he was grinning in the photo. It looked like he was home with his family, if the humble house in the background wasn't enough to confirm that, his caption did.

_love spending the holidays at home, how was yours? x_

Liam, without thinking, he's getting way too impulsive, really. Someone should stop him sometimes. 

He posts a photo of his own. Just a simple one of his feather tattoo.

_it's cold without you._

**Author's Note:**

> Hellooooooo! I know, I know. I'm alive?!?!?!? 
> 
> I still am. Completely done with school responsibilities. Like, I am officially done with school. YAY! I didn't really think of getting back to writing, but this came up??
> 
> Actually thinking of doing more, I hope I can. I'm just, really free as of the moment and I feel like this could also be an apology?? For leaving you all hanging with "What About Us?" to be honest with you, I still don't know how to go about with that one. I'm really sorry, but I am extremely grateful to those that still support and have been waiting. I will give an update as to my writing plans when I can finally gather my thoughts and make sense of everything happening. 
> 
> Hope you had a great holiday season, loves!! xx


End file.
